One of the only reasons why I keep my Facebook account active is because it keeps me in contact with Middle Brother. We're pretty much all the family that either has got. I mean, I have my father, but that's it. And Middle Brother only has me (he's my half-brother, but we were raised to ignore that fact). He updates rarely and its usually forwards of one kind or another, but they're there and it's a small bit of contact I'd like to retain.

He came over last night because he's moved back to the area and right before he arrived at the apartment, I was struck with the realization that I had not seen him since December. It left me unsteady for a few moments, with a bitter and metallic taste in my mouth.

We hung out for several hours, me and him, the Engineer and the Amazing Larry. Middle Brother sat in the recliner and drank his shitty beers and talked a lot of nonsense about aliens and programs on the History Channel. It was a good time and he left with the two of us making plans for me to visit his new apartment in the very near future.

When I logged into Facebook this evening, I saw that he had "liked" the page: I WISH I HAD MY MOM I TRULY MISS HER TAKE CARE OF YOUR MOM CAUSE YOU DONT KNOW HOW LONG YOU HAVE HER

And it made me cry. Even though it'll be six years in November since she died, we still don't talk much about her. I don't know if it's our family-taught brand of stoicism or our own emotional stuntedness, but we just don't talk about her. Once in a while, one of us will pass a comment about her, but it's always in a general our mom was a little bit nuts, in a slightly annoying and charming way. And whenever it happens, we both smile for a brief time and kind of share a small laugh over it because, at her heart, this was very true.

She could also be a real ball-breaker, our mother. And I won't lie and say that I don't carry many scars. She could be warm, when she let herself and when we, because it's not all her fault, let her. She loved us fiercely and would go to great lengths to protect us. One of the things she said in the lead up to her death was that she was scared. She was scared and worried for my brother and I because she wouldn't be there to take care of us. When she said it, I put my arms around her and told her not worry about us. And while it didn't settle her mind completely, it was enough to calm her.

She loved us. But, at the same time, she was deeply unhappy with how her life had turned out. Even back before the cancer was just the barest thought of an abnormal cell in her blood, she was miserable. Pregnant at 16 and married to an abusive narcissist. Divorced at 23, with two young boys in tow and no skills to survive. Married again to a man she didn't love because her attorney told her to "get married yesterday" because her ex-husband was making noises about a custody battle. A single mother, who initiated the divorce, in that time was not a sympathetic figure. Working an endless stream of dead-end, soul-killing jobs. Failed relationship after failed relationship. Drunk mother. Dead father. All of that and then cancer gnawing away at your guts? Yeah, I'd be a downright cunt about the entire affair too.

So, I don't blame her for being miserable. She didn't have many options. The disparity between her life at 35 and my life at 35 gives me The Fear and the idea of a very similar bullet I am dodging every day leaves me awake at night. No blame and no grudge held, but the scars remain.

Every year, they grow a bit fainter. I look in the mirror in the morning and see her face more clearly every day.

Last night, my brother had himself a good laugh over the thick crop of white hairs I have been growing as of late. I haven't dyed my hair since January or so because I haven't had the money, so my grey has gone dandelion wild. Despite the fact that he is older than me by five years, I'm the one who got hit with the shitty end of the genetic stick. Both of my parents were completely grey by the age of 25. He only has half of the faulty genes I'm afflicted with and from all reports, his own father still has a full head of jet black hair.

Her birthday is coming up in two months. I should go to the ocean for a visit. Labor day weekend, perhaps.

I got it into my head this afternoon to clean out the hallway closet. Who knows why? It's not as if, or so the Engineer said when he came home this evening and I forced him to go see, we go in there all that often. It's for storage; it's a closet.

But, the idea that he couldn't get to his comic books always chafed my ass, mostly because I knew that his not being able to easily reach his long boxes spells the comics being left on the kitchen table, which always equals a rather irritated me.

It's a fuckoff big closet, too, for those of you playing along at home who have never been to my apartment. And for those of you who haven't known me all that long, it's also my former bedroom. Which should do wonders in telling you that this is no ordinary closet.

It's about 12 feet by three feet, if I remember correctly. Or 9 by 3, I forget which. And I used to have the majority of my worldly possessions in there, along with my bed and a oscillating fan. I was so psyched when my mother and I originally looked at this apartment because, after having been kickbanned from the UK and torching my former life, I had been sleeping on her couch for many months. We couldn't afford a three bedroom between the three of us and I technically wasn't supposed to be permanently staying.

Almost ten years later and here I still am. And the closet is once again a closet. It's full of everything that the Engineer and I couldn't make fit into the rest of the apartment when we combined our habitats, all the belongings we refused to part with. His bass is in there, and its amp, neither of which have been touched in over a year. My turntable and all my mother's vinyl, which I haven't played in God knows how long. You get the picture.

I had to take the day off from work yesterday and do a bunch of driving around, from one school to the other, because MCCC told me the week prior they had lost my goddamn transcripts. The ones I hand-delivered back in March, remember those? Yeah. Lost them. Poof!

So, I hie my ass hither and yon to get new transcripts, then drive up to the school. Upon plunking my ass down in the financial aid office with the woman who told me to calm down, miss on the phone, I find out that now the system is showing they have them.

What the actual fuck?

This is just not cool, but all I can do is laugh. It's either laugh or start screaming hysterically. I am wound tightly as of lately. If one would take their finger and flick my arm, I would most likely ting! like fine crystal.

It's so frustrating, all of this. Half the time, I'm not even sure what the point of all of this is. Is it avoiding a fate like my mother's? Working a dead and menial job for the rest of my life until I find myself in an early grave? Or am I just chasing some stupid ideal pounding into my head since my head was able to be pounded into? This stupid dream.

At any rate, I am now at least registered for four classes (remember that part about me being part time for the time being? Not happening, apparently), with three online and one in person. I can only take one funeral services class because I still need a final anatomy and physiology course, but there's nothing available for me this semester, so I'm taking a bunch of doofy electives online to pass the time and keep the loan servicing agents off my neck. Abnormal psych, Moral Choices, and Women in Literature. And so it goes.

A bright and shining spot in the day, or at least one I am attempting to cling to in a fake-it-till-you-make-it sort of way is that I finally received my diploma. I stood out in the parking lot with the sun beating down on my head with the Engineer's fifteen-year old cousin standing next to me (she's visiting from California and I stole her away for the day to keep me company). I opened the thick navy blue folder the diploma had been placed in and read the words granting me a degree.

It's so fucking weird. And I kept saying so. Shelby, the cousin, asked what was so strange about it. I told her how I'm the first person in my family to receive a degree, the first to have even graduated high school, let alone college. But, now I've got this fancy piece of very expensive paper to broadcast that accomplishment. I want nothing more than to show it to my mother, because she's the only one of my blood who would really give a damn that it even happened.

My father thinks it's great that I'm going to school, but it's in this kind of meandering and vague way. He doesn't understand why I need a degree to do what I want to do and thinks it's kind of ridiculous. Middle Brother just gets kind of quiet when I talk about it and has, once or twice, accused me of being a braggert when I talked about my grades.

My mother would have taken my hands in her own and kissed my face, over and over. She always loved it when I did things she was never able to do and even though I never heard much in the way of I'm proud of you, I could at least feel it coming off of her in waves.

I'd like to feel that at least once in a while from the remaining family. I recognize it's just me beating myself against that brick wall again, but the desire remains.

Holiday dinner went as well as to be expected. The turkey fell apart when I tried to hoist it out of the pan when it was done, dinner was an hour and a half late because I'm not so good with time management, and wemble narc'ed my brother out over a piece of pie.

I got strangely and vaguely surly mid-way through the day, which I am attributing to a case of the holiday-ick. I was surprisingly un-hungry and just pushed food around on my plate for twenty minutes, which isn't unusual when I've got a good surly brewing. The pendulum swung back after a bit and I started feeling like more like my normal, slightly chirpy self.

I did, however, at one point inform my father that after he dies and I receive my inheritance from him, I am going to be knee-deep in strippers and blow. He was not nearly as amused by this as I was. But that's ok, because shortly after, he rolled out his annual "Why don't you and Middle Brother talk to Eldest Brother? That's not right; you're family." speech we seem to have the pleasure of hearing every holiday function. Only there were no semi-colons involved because I'm fairly certain my father has no earthly idea of what a semi-colon even is, let alone- how to use one. Not to mention the fact he said it to me and didn't actually type it anywhere.

There is now a boatload of leftovers at my apartment (including two and a half pies!) and I am sitting at work about to eat my boots because I haven't been able to have lunch today and I am starving.

All in all, not to worst of holiday experiences. Despite the brief surly attitude and the bout of weepiness mid-afternoon because I was missing my mom pretty hardcore. Oh, and the cat deciding to run over my face when I was lying on the couch. I am now sporting a rather fetching scratch on my right eyelid which hurts and is swollen. The cat received no leftovers for his trangressions. Little bastard.

For the majority of my life, I have envied those who were able to definitively state where there families came from. Heritage-wise, I've always drawn a bit of a short stick. Every person in my family claims a thousand different things, to the point where if all of it were to be true, we would be the worst sort of schizophrenic mutts. And while this could very well be possible, I've always felt that maybe it wasn't quite true. Obviously this could just be wishful thinking on my part, due to my desire to be able to point to a group of people and say, Them. That's where I come from. and thus, celebrate that blood. I'm more than willing to admit defeat in that area, if I could only pin down where the schizophrenic mutts came from and just how they came to be so schizophrenic in the first place.

So, this weekend I decided to finally put up or shut up and begin researching my family line. There's a particular interest in the direct maternal and paternal lines (my mother's maiden name and my father's name) because both surnames are fairly unusual and no one has really been able to give much information on them other than vague claims of French (for my mother) and Polish (for my father) ancestry, with a mixture of all manner of bullshit thrown in-between for good measure.

I began mapping everything out, which was a little difficult because after I got down all of my grandparents' names, I had already hit a roadblock. My mother and both of her parents are long dead, so they aren't able to supply me with any names. And anyone on that side of the family who may possibly know names doesn't speak to me. Both of my father's parents are dead and my father himself never knew his paternal grandparents. Great-grandparents, obviously, were also out of the question.

I tooled around online for a bit, reading up on how to properly set this kind of thing together, when I found the website www.ancestry.com, which is fantastic for this sort of thing. You plug in the names of family into a tree and if anyone else with a tree on this website has their names, a little leaf pops up that you can click on and follow the information trail. It also gives you dings if the name turns up in all manner of records. Social security death index, birth and death registrations, immigration records, etc.

I managed to get a bit further with some of the names I didn't know, though a couple of them are still a little questionable and need to be further looked into.

My father's side:

If I've got the correct people, then it would appear that my paternal/paternal (my father's father's side) great-grandfather, Charles, immigrated to this country in roughly 1900 from either Poland or Russia (one record says Poland, another says he was born in Russia). His wife, Bertha, came here from Russia in 1904. That line bottoms out right there, however.

My paternal/maternal line (my great-great-great-grandfather, Chas), again if everything is correct, got here from Germany in 1883. And his wife, Henrietta, came here from Switzerland also in 1883. This also bottoms out after this point.

My mother's side:

My maternal/maternal line stops right at my great-grandparents, George and Helen. Can't get anything after them without embarking on some serious detective work.

But, my maternal/paternal line gave me quite a ride. The side my mother's maiden name came from crapped out in the 1800s, roughly and I haven't been able to get any further with it yet. My great-great-great grandmother, Ellen Morgan, was a jackpot. I got back to 1560 with that last name, before it crapped out on me. The Morgans, it would appear were in Wales at that point. The last Morgan I found, William, was born in 1560 and died in 1592. From his wife, Frances Somerset, I was able to get a line tracing back to 1116. 1116? That's INSANE. But it wasn't a straight shot of Somersets. Whenever a husband would crap out, his wife would be able to give me more traces and vice versa. I had to hop back and forth between the lines, but they all converged in the Somersets.

The Somersets turned into the Beauforts in around 1436. Don't know why. And the Beauforts stopped giving me information right after that with Edmund Beaufort, who died in 1455. So, I started tracing his wife, Eleanor Beauchamp. The Beauchamps stopped in 1401 with Thomas Beauchamp, so I started with his wife, Margeret Ferrers. The Ferrers turned into the de Ferrers, who ended with Henry de Ferrer in 1343. His wife, Isabel de Verdun, gave me the de Clares, and the de Clares took me to 1116. And every fucking single one of them from that point until about my great (x8) grandfather was English. And he, Edward, was born here in 1670. At the end of that particular journey, I had Roger de Clare (1116-1173) and his wife, Maud de St. Hilary (1132-1193). And I had William Mafonache Fitz Robert (1116-11183) and his wife, Hawise De Beaumont Of Leicester (1129-1197). I can probably go a bit further with some of them, but I got tired and gave that side a rest.

On my grandfather's maternal side, I also got quite a bit back with another set of Morgans (unrelated to the ones on his maternal side). They bottomed out in the 1700s with Jeremiah (born in Kentucky in 1798), so I switched to his wife, Elizabeth New (1787-1858). The News became the Neus in 1725 with Johann, who was born in Germany and died in Virginia. And the Neus go back to to 1590 with Hans. It also gets a bit wonky in this area because one of the names, Paul Fischer, turned up on both sides of the goddamn line. From what I can see, he married a woman named Agnes and they had a daughter named Anna C. Fischer in 1592. He also apparently had a daughter with a woman named Catharina in 1658, named Anna M. Fischer. Anna C. had a son named Hans George Neu. And Anna M. had a daughter named Anna C. Gentes. Hans George Neu and Anna C. Gentes got married and had a son named Johann Peter Neu. It's possible that Catharina is actually Agnes and it's a mistake because it lists her as marrying Paul Fischer on the same day that it lists Agnes as marrying him. BUT, their daughters had children who went on to marry each other. First cousin love. I'll withhold any snarky commentary connecting them to certain members of my family.

At any rate, that side is straight-up German from roughly 1569.

To recap so far: Polish and/or Russian on my father's side from his father. German and Swiss on my father's mother's side. I think the German bit is hilarious because, according to my father, my great-grandfather on that side apparently insisted we were Austrian and would throw the fuck down whenever anyone thought he was German. I'm willing to bet that started around WWII.

English and German on my mother's side from her father. Apparently, amongst the English blood, there's also some minor nobility with a couple Earls and a castle and some such. When I told Middle Brother about this, he said: So, who's the asshole who fucked that up for us? I really, really want to delve further into my mother's maiden name end of things because it is a full-on French name and I'd love to see what that produces.

I think I may have to start writing to whatever Powers That Be to get copies of birth certificates from my more closer family members, like my grandparents, to definitively nail down their parents' names. That should be a big help, I reckon.

+ Aristotle ate for me! Not a single pet store around here had anything even resembling frozen rat pups, so I decided to attempt giving him one of the frozen mice I already had in my freezer. And he went all om nom nom on it. Hooray!

+ I also held him. Twice. And he seems to be comfortable with me.

- The police were called at my office on Friday due to the unruly father of an underage patient. I got in his face because I seem to not notice when people are bigger and scarier than me.

+ I made chili for fifty last night.

- It's currently sitting in giant vats on my stove and now I can't make anything to eat until it's moved.

- And I can't move it on my own.

- It also has to be transported this evening to the Engineer's lodge.

+/- Bills are paid. Mostly. I'm also starting the process of a debt snowball.

+ That being said, upon looking at my current debt (which excludes school debt), I'm not as far in the hole as I thought I was. Shit, my debt could be sneered at by my most people. My debt could be one normal person's credit card balance, if'n you want to get technical. Things are hesitantly looking up.

+ My brother is in Vegas for the next few days. Here's to hoping that the hotels don't once again circulate flyers about him, stating that he is potentially a pimp. Don't ask.

+ Classes start on Tuesday!

- I still don't have my goddamn book card, with which to buy my text books. I called Financial Aid to see what the deal was and they told me because I registered so late (news to me, I knew it was late but I didn't think it was OMFG Y U SO LATE TARA) that I need to pick up my book stipend on Wednesday. Which comes after Tuesday. Which is when my first class starts.

+ Watched Severance last night. It's probably one of the better movies I've seen in a long time.

- I was going to go into work yesterday and make chili today, but I decided to reverse the days and switch activities. Now that I've woken up, I've got a screaming headache and thusly, do not want to go into work. Maybe I'll just stay home and clean. And eat ice cream. And watch Notes on a Scandal.

Earlier this afternoon, the remote control to my television went AWOL. I know I didn't lose it, because when I came home this morning, I didn't lay my hands on it once because my brother was watching football. Therefore, he fucking lost it.

Scandal has erupted at work as our IT guy announced yesterday at lunch that he was planning on getting married.

Not too terribly off the wall, right? Well. Let's put this in list form:

1. They met on the internet three months ago.2. They only met in person one month ago.3. The wedding is this Saturday.4. She's not a citizen of this country.5. She's not moving in with him until sometime next year.

IT guy is a bit miffed with me because when he told me about the upcoming nuptials, my response was a flippant "My condolences." What can I say?At the time, I was in a spectacularly bad mood as it was and marriage isn't one of my favorite things in this world. I think it's archaic, pointless, and rarely serves any purpose other than to muck up a perfectly good relationship (there are obviously exceptions to this rule, so don't come storming my castle with your stories about how great wedded bliss is, I'm not going to listen).

He also won't listen to anyone about anything. He asked me about changing his W4 to claim as married and I recommended that he hold off on doing it, due to the issues with incurring one's spouse's debt. He says he trusts her. I kept myself from rolling my eyes at him. The executive assistant had a conversation with him about waiting a bit before getting married. He says, "she's the one!" Executive assistant tells him that is she is the one, than she'll still be the one in six months. Or a year. He ignores her.

IT guy is an odd duck, to begin with. When we first started the hellish benefit drive that I have been immersed in for the past two fucking months, he asked the sales representative for the life insurance if the money is still paid out to one's beneficiaries is one commits suicide. I don't get this guy. At all.

At this point, I am ignoring all conversation about the wedding. It's his life. I'm tired of hearing about it at the office. Almost everyone else is running around, clucking like a barnyard of hens, over the scandaliciousness of it all. I hide in my office a lot.

---

My hand is fux0red, I think. All of the pain is centered in my index finger and coasts down to about my wrist level, on occasion. I can't crack that knuckle anymore, which is slowly driving me insane. And it aches fiercely in the cold or when I have to handwrite anything, which is making note-taking for my classes a lot of fun. It even hurts in the webbing between my thumb and my index finger. I don't know what the hell is up. All I know is that I woke up like this last week. It occasionally crabs up into a claw and I have to manually unfold my fingers with my other hand.

This should make cooking for Thanksgiving next week a rollarcoaster of joyousness.

---

Speaking of the holiday, I haven't even started planning a menu yet. And I have to go food shopping this weekend for it, once my father gives me some money towards the bill. The staples will be there, of course. Roasted turkey (I'm thinking of brining it, but I don't know), mashed potatoes with sour cream and possibly creme fraiche, whole cranberry sauce with orange juice and ginger, cathead biscuits, pie of a various nature. But, what else? Stuffing muffins, obviously. I need to make those, or there will be a riot in my apartment.

I'm not feeling it this year. I wasn't feeling Halloween, either.This does not bode well.

---

My Stress Management professor found out tonight that I'm smoking again. He was good about it, although he did lightly tease me. That stopped when I told him how bad the withdrawal symptoms had gotten and how crazy they made me. He told me that almost forty-eight hours was completely respectable for my first time out of the gates. I told him that I think I need drugs to get through it. He asked me what kind and laughed loud enough to frighten the class when I responded, "Opium, mostly."

Last week, I got into a knock-down, drag-out fight in my Human Services class with one of my classmates, an older guy who has been chafing my ass from day one. He never shuts the fuck up. Like, seriously. And he constantly interjects these pointless and rambling anecdotes into almost every lecture. He started talking some barely concealed smack on the gays and I lit up like a fireworks display, much to the amusement of the rest of the class who all tittered nervously when I busted out with "THAT'S THE BIGGEST BUNCH OF BULLSHIT I'VE EVER HEARD!" after this guy started talking about Navy guys on all-men submarines potentially not being able to control themselves around all that manflesh.

The professor kept getting between us and I would instantly stop. She's the professor, word of God and all that in the classroom, and I instantly respect her position of authority, but then he would spout some more mealy-mouthed, homophobic nonsense and it would get me fired up all over again. And he kept interupting me whenever I would put my hand up and comment about something, which immediately pisses me off. I thought the girl sitting behind me was going to pee herself when I called him a knuckle-dragging asshat.

I've been having problems with his existence all semester AND he's in my Intro to Counseling class, as well.

I've never hated a total stranger so much in my entire life. I want the streets to run red with his blood. I want his brain matter caked under my nails. I want him tortured to death by small, yapping syphillis-laden dogs.

I went to my Introduction to Counseling class. We had our first test to take and were allowed to leave as soon as we were finished. Being that Counseling is a butt-easy class, I was done the test in fifteen minutes. I was in my car and cruising home, with visions of glorious fucking-around-and-doing-nothing-at-home dancing in my head. Maybe I'd study Human Biology for a bit, maybe I'd play some video games. I hadn't really decided at that point; I was more focused on enjoying my drive home.

I get home and immediately go into my room to check my answering machine. On my bed are three of my four cats. Nympho, Mittens, and Lunchbox Tinker. I laid down on the bed and talked to Nympho for a bit because it's so rare to catch him napping in my room. Tinker moseyed up and acted like a douchebag because he hates it when someone else is getting all the attention. Mittens walked up and started to weasel around me for some petting. I reached over and rested my hand on the back of Mittens' neck, in the usual spot where I scratch him, and my fingers touched what I thought felt like a scab.

"What did you do to yourself now, buddy?" I twiddled my fingers gently around his neck, feeling for the dimensions of the scab and trying to figure out if it was Tinker-caused. When I pulled my hand away, it was covered in blood.

I'll repeat that part: covered in blood.

I picked him up to look at his scruff, but his fur is so thick and the lights in my room are rather dim. So, I brought him into the bathroom, where the lighting is much better, and put him on the counter for a better look.

When I parted the fur on the back of his neck, I almost fainted. I seriously got wobbly for a second.

He had a two-inch gash and I could see straight down to what looked like muscle.

I flailed around for a couple of moments, trying to figure out what to do. Should I try to clean it myself? With what? Would he even hold still for something like this? Does he need stitches? Should I take him to the vet? I spun my tires for a bit before decided that yes, I needed to call the vet. Phone calls are placed, the cat is unceremoniously shoved into his carrier, and I get back into my car.

The vet is just as confused as I am about the cut. Mittens hasn't gone outdoors for probably ten or more years. There was no blood anywhere that I could find in the apartment. No one had bloody paws or whiskers. Stumped.

He got his ruff shaved and surgical-glued, I got handed yet another bottle of antibiotics and wrote out even more post-dated checks to be put in my file. At this point, I have checks stretching to July. I shit you not.

Now, with his half-shaven neck and wounded area, he kind of looks like a zombie took a big old bite out of the back of his head. It's semi-disturbing to look at. The Engineer keeps calling him "Zombie Cat".

*sigh*

The lady at the vet's office who I'm friendly with started laughing as soon as she saw me. "You were just here two weeks ago!" Tell me something I don't know, honey. Tell it to my bank account.

Today started out fairly decent. I actually got up early this morning and even had time to wear more make-up than just eyebrows, something which hasn't been happening all that much lately. The decentness doesn't last long. We're in the middle of a document-collecting drive for a new benefits package and the offices are driving me insane with their unwillingness to do what is required of them. Today, however, is payday. Yay! I get my check and it's for roughly sixty-eight hours and is under seven hundred dollars. Boo. And I don't even get the chance to leave the office to cash said check and get some lunch until about two-thirty.

This is where it gets good.

I drive to the bank, which is located in the Devil's Parking Lot. It's in a little shopping center and is surrounded by a handful of stores that are highly visited. It is also made of evil.

I was driving down a row, heading to the teller lane of the drive-through, and marvelling to myself that the drive-through lane was completely empty. It's never empty like that! I'm going to make it back to the office in record time! Hooray!

Then?

WHAM!

A car I was passing suddenly backs out as I am almost half-way done going behind it. My passenger side door crunches and my vision is replaced by a red haze. You know the scenes in Kill Bill when the Bride sees someone that is on her list to kill and she gets those alarm bells sounding off? Yeah, like that.

I get out and see that I was broad-sided by a goddamn Mercedes driving by a goddamn teenage girl. The Eldorado doesn't look all that bad, but the door is mighty scratched up and there appears to be a small dent or three. The bumper of the Mercedes is scratched all to fuck and my hands start shaking. The girl immediately starts apologizing and telling me that this was all her fault and that she didn't check her mirrors and that she'd really rather handle this without contacting any insurance companies. Being that the Eldorado is actually my father's call, I ring him up and ask him what he would like me to do. Which was a fun conversation in itself. My father really hates getting phone calls from me that start out with, "Hi! I have a problem." especially because they almost always wind up having something to do with the damn car.

He tells me to just get all of her information because he doesn't want to involve the insurance companies, either. I remain unconvinced by the wisdom of this, but it's his car and what he says goes. We exchange information (I even write down her license plate number because I just don't trust this shit) and go about our ways.

As I write this, I am still ticked off by the entire affair. But, wait! It all gets better!

As it turns out, he was also involved in a car accident. In a bank parking lot. Backed into by some dippy teenage girl who wasn't looking where she was going. Same bank chain, different branch. Different branch parking lot. Same area damaged on his car.

His issue, however, is that the girl who hit him really nailed him. She gassed the shit out of her car and his passenger side back door is dented and scraped all to fuck. And on top of that, the girl is insisting it wasn't her fault. Despite the fact that she backed into him. And despite the fact that even the cop who was called to the scene explained to her several times and in intricate detaill how my brother couldn't have done a single thing to cause the accident.

Shit. Day.

Personally, I'm still kind of baffled over how my brother and I both were involved in almost identical car accidents in the same goddamn day and in the same general environment, sustaining similar damage to our cars.

I have since spent the rest of the night lying on my couch with Baby and watching movies with the Engineer.

The following is my entry written on Friday night, but was not posted due to my internet connection being borked for a while and I was busy all weekend:

I was actually doing ok today. Well, err, yesterday since it's now after midnight.

I had come to terms with the fact that I was indeed aging another year, and a pivotal year at that. 33! My "Jesus Year", as Joanna calls it. To be brutally frank, and quite dopey, the thing that really clinched it for me was the realization that my now-current age is also a Smashing Pumpkins song. I never said I wasn't a dork.

At any rate.

I was actually doing ok. Work was incredibly annoying, but I muddled through it. I came home, cleaned up the apartment a bit because people will be here on Saturday night and no one wants an icky apartment to hang out in. I took parts four and five of a five part online Human Biology exam. I fed the cats and the ferret. I opened presents from the Engineer (and dude, let me tell you how he's won boyfriend points for the rest of this year because he got me a wee bat preserved bat in a jar). I made dinner. I ate some leftover cake smash from a failed bake-sale experiment. I watched Ghost Hunters.

And then, around eleven o'clock, it hit me.

My father hadn't called me to wish me a happy birthday.

What. The. Blithering. Fuck.

Some of you may remember last year when I got my panties twisted because my brother forgot my birthday. And this same group of you may also remember that in the entry I wrote about that particularly fun event, I stated that I really don't ask for much when it comes to my birthdays. I don't expect fan-fare or presents; shit, I don't even expect a card. I don't require a fuss to be made over me. And I mean this shit; it's not just spin to make me look saintly.

What I do require, however, is that certain people in my life verbally acknowledge the occasion. They are, in descending order of "you're going to get your ass handed to you if you forget this shit": my boyfriend, my father, my brother, and my best friend.

That's it. Four people. I told you I don't ask for much.

And I find it enormously fucked up that people I've been friends with online for a very short time managed to put forth the effort that my own goddamn father couldn't pull off. Hell, even Thee Pumpkin Girl text-messaged me to wish me a happy birthday and I haven't heard from her since, like, March.

This hurts.

A lot more than I realized at first.

When I was discussing this with Wemble on the phone tonight, she said, "Well. Maybe he's coming over early tomorrow morning with a big surprise present for you." And all I could do was laugh. I can't even remember the last time my father bought me a present for anything, let alone my birthday. But, that's not even the point. The point is that he forgot. And I am pissed.

At the same time, I feel incredibly guilty for being angry and upset. I've sat here for an hour now, writing in fits and starts, deleting almost every complaint I have because it makes him sound like a deadbeat douchebag. And nestled in between the guilt are vast waves of worry. What if something happened to him?

I don't know.

I'm going to bed. If I sit here and think about this any more than I already have, I'm just going to make myself even more upset. And that won't serve any purpose.

Maybe he'll call me tomorrow.

**EDIT**

Well. He did wind up calling me on Saturday. I'll give him that.

However, when one forgets one's only offspring's birthday and follows this up with a voicemail message stating, "I'm calling to wish you a happy birthday. I forgot to call you yesterday. Shit happens. Call me back. Love you." one is not looked on entirely too kindly by said only offspring. Shit, even Middle Brother remembered this year. And he got me a card. Two cards, even. In my family, that's our version of a sloppy demonstration of affection. One card in my family is like a banner day in a regular family's birthday reportoire. Two cards? That's like getting a goddamn pony or something.

I love my father; I really do. And not only because he's only one of two family members that I still really acknowledge. He's my daddy. And he's done a fuck of a lot for me in my life. But, he's also let me down more times than I can goddamn count.

Sure, the good outweighs the bad. But, it doesn't make the bad hurt any less.

I really need to come to terms with the fact that I will never have the family that I've wanted for as long as I can remember. How the hell am I supposed to accomplish that?

The Engineer and I travelled up to North Jersey yesterday to be merry-marking holiday people with Miss Robin, Saint Rick, and Saint Rick's metric fucktonne of relatives very large family.

It was more than a bit disconcerting, to be quite honest, to witness such a huge and friendly gathering of people who are all related to one another. My tiny, dysfunctional family did not prepare me for such an event and thusly, I spent some time feeling quite overwhelmed.

Don't get me wrong, it was not a bad experience. Not by a long shot (especially the uncle from Brooklyn who pegged the Engineer as one of them there Wickerns, because he was one also). Saint Rick's mother was astonishing with how warm and inviting she was to every single person who came across her path. So, not a bad experience. Just very, very odd for me.

I spent a large part of the day sitting at one of the tables, staring with Bambi-eyed fright at the rest of the room and a diet Coke clutched in my wee fist. Many side trips were taken onto the back porch for cigarettes and accidential conversation about one's neighbors and their anal sex habits. Everyone was so freaking nice. Genuinely nice.

Later on and full as a tick, I spent the rest of the evening lying on a couch with Miss Robin, her wonderful cat, and a sack full of candy provided by Saint Rick's mother. We watched the Engineer play first Guitar Hero, and then Wii ("YOU WON, DOUCHEBAG!"). Following all of this up was the season opener of the Sopranos, more candy, and a very dozy ride home.

Today, I'm full of power-C Vitamin Water, disgust for my work place and a strange (though all too familiar) longing for a family like Saint Rick's. It makes me angry, how fucked up and scattered my family truly is, so I try not to brood on it too much. But, experiences like yesterday really drive the nail home.

I recognize that every single family on this planet holds drama, big drama. I don't expect any different. I just wish my own family could be slightly more cohesive and...normal, I guess. Instead, mine is just a collection of backbiting and feral miscreants.

She's been gone for just over two years now, but it is always startling to me how my mother still creeps into family gatherings and watches quietly from the corner. Her name was evoked last night, frequently and with great love.

Last night was enjoyable, except for the ages-old arguement between my father and I over how the Mason-Dixon does not extend to New Jersey. It's been quite some time since he started prattling on about that how part of New Jersey is considered the South (tm), I'd almost forgotten how much I want to kick him when he does. He wasn't as melancholy as last year's gathering, which is always good, but there was still an odd air about him. I know he was at the bar before he got to my apartment (and he was late getting there!), but he wasn't visibly drunken or anything of the sort. He just seemed...off.

He got a sad cast to his features when talking to Middle Brother and I about how we're not associating any longer with Eldest Brother. I had to explain to him that this isn't just a case of family nonsense; we simply can not put our selves and our hearts on the line for that man anymore. He causes too much pain and takes no responsibility. Of course, my verbal version of this to my father included far more profanity because I had been hitting the wine all afternoon as I cooked dinner and I know the color was high in my cheeks by the time dinner rolled around.

Still, all in all, the evening went well. I didn't burn anything down, I only forgot one thing (and it was a pre-dinner baked brie en croute), and Wemble only fell asleep once. I still have a load of dishes in my sink that are currently weighing on my obsessiveness, but I'm going to take care of them when I get home from work.

There are very few people who I demand expect to remember my birthday (which was yesterday). I can count them on one hand, as a matter of fact, and two of them are family. The other two are my boyfriend and my best friend. That's four, total. It used to be five, but my mother died, and the part of the "boyfriend" has been played by various people in the past and has even been upgraded to "husband" once. No more. Now it's just four. My father, my brother, my best friend, and my boyfriend. That's all I ask.

And as any of those four will tell you, I am not grabby with the presents. I generally don't even care if I get a card (I prefer no cards, to be quite honest-take notes, if you like, because I always feel bad when I throw out birthday or holiday cards that people give to me). I am completely content with just receiving well wishes on my birthday; it is the only thing I ask for on that specific day.

So.

When one of those four people manages to FORGET FOR THE SECOND YEAR IN A ROW, I get a wee bit snotty over the whole affair.

Want to know who it was? I'll give you a hint: it wasn't my father, boyfriend, or best friend).

Last year, Middle Brother forget and never actually even said anything about it. Ever. I've had other people forget or miss the day or whatnot, then follow up with a belated apology. Ok, fine. Sometimes, life gets in the way. I understand. However, it has now been a year and a day (imagine!) and he still has not said word one to me on the matter. Does he believe that these past two years have not passed and I am, in fact, still thirty (I wish)? The last time he wished me happy birthday was on my 30th.

What makes it even more hilarious is that yesterday, I took the day off from work. The night before, I had over a couple of friends and we spent the evening heavily drinking (Malibu rum and blood orange soda for me, milk stout and strawberry wheat beer for them), eating various snack foods (cheese, crackers, pepperoni, radishes), and watching the reunion episode of Project Runway. I stayed up until four o'clock in the morning talking absolute drunken nonsense with Joanna, then slept until half one in the afternoon. It was grand. The Engineer gave me my birthday presents, and I was a happy girl.

My brother saw that I had people over for the ceremonial heavy drinking and eating of bad things. He came home in the middle of it. Not a word, not even when he was picking through the party tray of food I had made up.

The next day, when he came home from work and I was lying on the living room floor watching bad plastic surgery programs, with my birthday presents scattered all around me, still not a light bulb went on in his head. We even had conversations where I gave him ample opportunity to come to his senses.

him: What, no work today?me: Nope.him: What, did you call out?me: No, I planned for the day off.him: Joanna, too?me: Yeah, we both took the day off. We've been planning it for weeks.

(later...)him: Hey, did you buy a new fan?me: No. The Engineer bought it for me.him: Oh.

(later...)him: What's this? Rum?me: Yeah. Joanna gave it to me as a present.

At one point in the early evening, we were having a conversation about a girl he'd been seeing and I had asked him what had happened to her (she hadn't been around in some time). And he told me the story of them not seeing each other anymore, which involved her not calling him on his birthday in September. I stood there, cocked an eyebrow at him and said, "Didn't wish you a happy birthday? Imagine."

Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

I don't want to be a twat about it. I don't want to make him feel bad. We both have a lot on our minds and the two of us have been a lot like the walking dead since our mother died, but what the fuck does it take? I don't want to walk into his room and shout about how he forgot my birthday again. I don't want to be a passive aggressive cunt. I want him to fucking remember it.

It's not that difficult to remember: the leaves begin to turn and the Halloween candy starts showing up in the stores, it's time for Tara's birthday. You know?

We're not that close and certainly not physically demonstrative, but a small nod to what sibling bond we do have would be nice. Fuck, I've only got two family members left on this planet; I don't think I'm asking for much.

Kahlua with chocolate milk and a big slab of gingerbread by the pound from Whole Foods and I'm beginning to feel a bit more human. A bit, I said. Let's not get crazy now.

I think I should do a banishing for the apartment, maybe hang some rue over the doorways and windows? I'm not sure. Last night, after Elder Brother left, I picked all of his cigarette butts and empty pack out of the trash and sealed them in a freezer bag from the cabinet. I just went on auto-pilot as I did it, calming retrieving them as I spoke to the Engineer and Middle Brother.

I want to do some sort of working against him, but I don't want him hurt. Perhaps an all-purpose 'piss off and never darken my doorstep again' would do, but nothing really nasty. I could get up to some serious dickens, if I so desired, but that's really not the route I wish to take. No matter how angry I am right now. Despite the fact that my reptile brain, which is normally quiet and sedate, is absolutely screaming for blood at the moment. And will be for quite some time. I was an absolute horror at work today, snapping and snarling at everyone who came to close. To the point where my boss took me aside and asked what was going on, because my personality had changed so drastically from what she's become used to seeing in the past three weeks. I felt simply awful about my behaviour and made a true effort throughout the rest of the day to not be such an utter twat.

hmm. Can't finish the gingerbread. Maybe one of the cats circling at my feet want it? Paws off the Kahlua, however. That bitch is all mine.

The eldest brother is out of our lives. Again and, I assume this time, for good. I sat at the kitchen table and clenched my little hands into tight fists, nails digging bloody half-circles into my palms, against a roaring tide of rage as he called Middle Brother a fuck-up and and unjustly accused him of being a liar. So many times, I opened my mouth, in an attempt to shut things down, but something in the back of my head caused it to snap shut again without voicing any of my objections.. Middle Brother was standing his ground and holding his own. This was his fight and I was only peripherally involved, if that at all.

I had expectations of this extending into the wee hours of the night, like the last fight did. I continually stole glances at the clock, watching the minutes tick slowly by and refusing to leave the apartment because I feared for leaving them alone together. The Engineer wouldn't leave either, much to my discomfort. One's family, on a good day and in a normal group, can be slightly embarassing. My fucked-up family excels at embarassment because it seems as if they become even more insane and puerile whilst in the public eye.

At eight forty-five, I rubbed the bridge of my nose and lit a cigarette. Thought to myself that if this shit wasn't over by nine-fifteen, I was going to bust out a referee flag and call the match. Then, at nine o'clock, it screeched to a halt when I was barely paying attention. Before I knew it, the words, "...and I want you to leave. Now." came out of Middle Brother's mouth and Eldest Brother was being ushered towards the door with a slam and the locks being snapped into place. I heard him in the hallway, profanity and self-righteousness being spit at the door.

And then he was gone.

And I'm bothered by this more than I've been realizing. I spoke of it a small bit last night to the Engineer, after Middle Brother had finally gone to bed. That my entire life, all I ever wanted was one of those families who, you know, speak to each other.

I know better than to expect normalcy, no one gets to ride that particular free bus, but I'd like a sembalence of closeness, at the very least. I wanted a family that got together at the holidays. I wanted a family that called one another, even if it was to shriek at angry hyper-sonic levels once in a while. I wanted a family that could be in the same room, at the same time, and not have too many uncomfortable silences. I wanted a family that gathered for more than just funerals.

Apparently, this was just a bit too much to ask. I knew it was hopeless, this obscene wanting of mine, but it was there all the same. And when our mother died, I had nurtured a small and fervant hope that maybe this time, the three of us could be our own unit. That we would band together in the face of our grief and, somehow, work things out between us. That, at the very least, I could have a small tribe of people who shared blood with me. Other than my father, my brothers had been the only part of the family to associate with me. One side are too remote and removed from my upbringing to really give a damn about me or mine, the other side just plain want nothing to do with us for reasons not of our making.

Middle Brother and I had basically dropped any animosity towards Eldest Brother, in a good faith effort of extending the olive branch. But, it looks as if he just didn't give a damn about either of us. Ever. As always, it's about him. His pain. His shitty upbringing. How people treated him. Who has done him wrong. How he's put himself so out there for everyone else. And how no one has ever done the same for him.

We are both so, so tired of it all. And it hurts like fucking hell to shut him out of our lives once again. Only this time, it's not his choice like it was before, but ours. My emotions are warring in my head; a huge and swirling mass of sadness, anger, pain, disappointment, disgust and relief. I can't sort through them all without turning into a puddlemess. This hurts. And the hurt pisses me the fuck off. Why should I be hurt that a fucking junkie turned his back on us? Why should I be unhappy that someone of that low character wants nothing to do with Middle Brother and I? Why do I care? What difference does it make, honestly?

I don't want that sort of person in my life, so why am I so fucking upset over this?

Above all else and for the first time since she died in 2004, I am straight-up glad that my mother is dead. She didn't have to witness the filth spewing from Elder's Brother's mouth at Middle Brother and she also doesn't have to deal with the semi-unrelated VC Andrews-sized scandal I received confirmation of last night after all of this or any of its predicted and expected fallout.

All of this would have broken her heart, much as it's coming close to breaking mine.

"I'm sorry." I said to Middle Brother last night, after the smoke and debris began to settle."Don't be. What're you sorry for?""I'm sorry because I know you wanted this work. And because I wanted this to work. And it didn't."He ducked his head and wiped his face, as is his habit whenever he doesn't want to show any emotion.

Throughout today and last night before, I was wobbling on the knife-edge of hilarity. Maybe more like hysteria if you look at it a bit closer, but I just wasn't noticing the difference then.

Make your bed and now lie,just like you always do.You can fake it for the papers,but I'm onto you.I'm onto you.I'm onto you.I'm onto you.I'm onto you.

At a local food place, there is an alcoholic drink called the Tarantula Spiderbite.

It contains Jose Cuervo and many other yummy things. It also comes in a heavy glass goblet roughly the size and shape of my skull. Without the aid of a long straw, I need two hands to drink out of this container.

One and a half of these monster bitches downed and I will begin debating whether the English language is evolving or devolving based upon the usage of the word 'tatts' (for tattoos). Loudly. And with great gusto. With a drunken, Republican lawyer.

I never knew the phrase, "I will not idly stand by and watch some knuckle-dragging moron dry assrape the English language." would so swiftly silence three tables of people and various passerby. oops.

I think Joanna is still laughing about this and it's been almost three days.

This weekend has been basically quiet and without note. My brother is away in Las Vegas. I spent Saturday night after I got home from work cleaning because the Engineer drove up to North Jersey to see some old high school friends of his. Today, we went to the bookstore and I bought the new China Mieville and another book called, "Four and Twenty Blackbirds", which looks rather promising. I also had the distinct displeasure of standing next to some hoity-toity Marlton/Medford wifey in the new nonfiction releases section.

"Have you seen Hostel yet?" She said to her companion. "I hear it's absolutely wonderful. Of course it would be, Quentin Tarantino did it."

This caused me to seethe and pee myself with hilarity, all at the same time. Seething, because Quentin Tarantino did not "do" Hostel. Eli Roth did. He wrote it and directed it. Tarantino produced it. Big difference. I'm a big fan of Eli Roth, he also did Cabin Fever and that is one of my favourite horror movies. Peeing myself with hilarity, because I would pay rather large sums of money to be in the room when this uptight Coach-dripping bitch actually watches Hostel. From everything that I've heard so far, the first half hour of the movie is very similar to softcore porn and the rest of the movie is straight up gore. They used 150 gallons of fake blood for this, which is three times the amount they used for Cabin Fever. If you've never seen CF, then you wouldn't quite realize how mind boggling this is.

In addition to a trip to the bookstore, we also went to the hippie store Whole Foods, which is a grocery store I love like I'm receiving a paycheck to love it. They finally had the wonderful chocolate pudding I am so addicted to, instead of that vegan pussy carob bullshit that's been on the shelves the last few times I've been there. Carob is no proper substitute for chocolate, I don't care who says so. It is simply unacceptable.

So I happily bought real chocolate pudding and many other nifty food items I've been wanting, but no T42, which is a glorious bottled organic iced tea (made with organize cane sugar instead of fucking corn syrup) that I would have injected into my veins if I only could. It is exactly like the fresh brewed iced tea that my mother used to make for me., I could very well make it for myself if I weren't so goddamn lazy, but, damnably, I am and that will always be my downfall.

I've noticed that since I've started making an effort to eat more organically, I'm feeling quite a bit better, physically. My immune system is still dreadfully compromised and will remain so until I'm able to start seeing a doctor again on a regular basis, but overall I have more energy and I'm not feeling so sluggish. I'm attempting to keep my chemical intake (and non-whole foods intake) down to cigarettes, diet soda, and the occasional food product I have to buy because of limited income or availability. Pre-packaged shit is right out the fucking window, although today I discovered that Annie's makes a product similar to Hamburger Helper, just without all the crap in it. I bought two of them to see if they're any good.

Another benefit is that my brother appears to be afraid of organic food and refuses to eat it. He's incredibly picky about the stupidest things and despite the fact that I argued with him for almost a solid thirty minutes, he still can't quite grasp that the organic milk in the fridge is, indeed, just milk and not some strange soy or rice bullshit (which is not allowed over my threshold).

Mostly a good holiday. Wee bit of the uncomfortable when Eldest Brother showed up right after dinner tonight, but he managed to behave himself and actually he and I had what passes as a normal conversation in this family. I got uppitty and decided to make dinner again, which was lasagna (which I've never made before), green salad with various fresh vegetables, and homemade garlic bread (that I burned, a little). After dinner, quite a few of my friends showed up for chocolate pie (which I made) and shit-talking. I drank too much Kahlua and smoked a bit too much pot, which made me at my peak of hilarity. And Wemble and her husband left only about an hour and a half ago or thereabouts.

It's quiet now. And the apartment is almost immaculate (I cleaned all day before people came over). I don't necessarily have to go into work tomorrow because we were given the option of not coming in and receiving a paid holiday or coming in and receiving eight hours of holiday time on top of the hours we worked. I'm going to go in, just to get up some hours, but I'm going in late and I'm not staying forever.

However, now that I've just typed that, I remembered that on Friday, my car decided to start vomiting power-steering fluid and that it might not be a good idea to drive it tomorrow. So, I don't know. When my father looked under the car today, there was no power-steering fluid to be found. So, that leaves me wondering if maybe I just overfilled the damn thing (because I put some in there Friday morning) or if something is actually wrong. I have plans to take the car to the mechanic on Tuesday because of this and some (possibly) loose belts making it go grindy.

I don't know. I'm quite tired and still a little bit stoned, so I'm fairly certain I'm just rambling at this point.

There are curtains in my living room, for the first time in over five years. For the first time, period, in this apartment.

It completely changes the look of the room and makes me quite happy. Middle brother even commented on how great they look, which made me doubly happy because he's never commented on anything I've done to change the apartment since I originally started on this thrice-damned project.

The wonderfully decorated tree completely clashes with the rest of the room (it has green, blue and purple lights and baubles), but that doesn't bother me nearly as much as I thought it would. Who knows how I'll feel next year? But, for now, it's ok.

I also have extra dark chocolate (60%) Lindt chocolate truffles in a little bowl on my good red table my coffee table and that also makes me quite happy. It makes me feel incredibly grown-up and gives me the temptation to start shouting, "Look! I have candies! In a bowl! On my table! I am grown-up!" Which, of course, I will not do.

Saturday burned bright with me ditching work for the day and deciding that now was the time to do more moving things around the apartment/throwing stuff out.

This was one of the bigger jobs I've been needing to do, with a hell of a lot of junk having to be hauled all over the apartment, cleaned off, sorted through, and placed in its new home (whether that be somewhere else in the apartment or in the trash). Two of the things that needed to be emptied were the china cabinet that has been in my family for as long as I can remember and the natural wood hutch/cabinet thing. Both of these sat in the living room, where I did not want them to be. They're big and take up far too much room.